1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an endoscope system including an endoscope and a disposable protection cover for covering the endoscope, and also relates to a disposable protection cover, an endoscope and an apparatus for supporting the disposable protection cover for use in the endoscope system.
2. Description of the Related Art
An endoscope system has been widely utilized for providing diagnostic and therapeutic indications for coeliac cavities of patients and for inspecting an inside of a mechanical structure. To this end, there have been developed various kinds of endoscopes. For instance, in order to inspect or treating oesophagus, stomach and duodenum, upper endoscopes have been utilized. Further, colonoscopes have been developed to examine colons and sigmoidoscopes have been proposed to inspect rectums and sigmoid colons. In case of using the endoscope, an insertion portion of the endoscope has to be inserted into a cavity of a patient, so that the outer surface of the insertion section of the endoscope is contaminated with living tissues and liquids. When the thus contaminated endoscope is successively used for another patient, there might be a possibility of infection. Therefore, once the endoscope is used to diagnose and/or treat a patient, it is necessary to clean and sterilize the endoscope. Of course, the cleaning of the endoscope requires a substantial time and during this cleaning time, it is impossible to perform the endoscopic procedure by using this endoscope. In order to mitigate such an idle time, it is necessary to prepare a large number of endoscopes. However, the endoscope is rather expensive, so that it is practically difficult to prepare a large number of endoscopes particularly in a small hospital or clinic. Therefore, in almost all hospitals and clinics, in practice, after the endoscope has been used for examining or treating a patient, the endoscope is immediately cleaned. Typically, this cleaning requires several minutes to ten minutes. In order to effect the complete washing and sterilization, the cleaning has be to performed for several tens minutes.
Further, the endoscope has various channels such as air channel, water channel, suction channel, foceps channel which extend along the insertion section from a proximal end to a distal end thereof, and these channels except the foceps channel are connected via tubes to respective devices such as an air supply pump, water supply pump, water suction pump and air suction pump. These channels are subjected to contact with living tissues and liquids. However, in order to clean these channels of the endoscope completely, a relatively long time is required. Then, the endoscope could not be utilized efficiently for the long cleaning time. In a large hospital or clinic, a large number of endoscopes may be prepared in order to mitigate the problem of cleaning time. However, this solution results in the increase in the running cost. Further, in small clinics, it is practically impossible to prepare a number of expensive endoscopes.
Moreover, the endoscope might be broken during the cleaning and the usable time of the endoscope is liable to be shortened by the cleaning.
In order to avoid the above explained various problems, there has been proposed an endoscope system, in which the endoscope is covered with a disposable protection sheath-like cover having channels formed therein. For instance, U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,721,097, 4,741,3126, 4,825,850, 4,869,238, 4,991,564, 4991,565, 5,050,585 disclose various kinds of the disposable protection sheath-like covers having channels formed therein. In U.S. Pat. No. 4,646,722, there is shown an endoscope system in which the endoscope is covered with a protection sheath, while a tube having channels formed therein is inserted into the U-shaped cutout formed in an outer surface of the endoscope along a longitudinal axis thereof. Upon diagnosis, the insertion section of the endoscope is covered with the protection sheath, and after the inspection, the sheath is removed from the insertion section and is then discarded. Therefore, it is no more necessary to clean the endoscope after every inspection.
In the above mentioned U.S. Patent, the protection sheath-like cover is constructed to cover only the insertion section of the endoscope, but does not cover an operation section of the endoscope. It should be noted that the operation section of the endoscope is treated by hands of doctors and operators and thus is brought into contact with the living tissues and liquids of a patient. Therefore, in order to remove the contamination of the operation section of the endoscope due to such living tissues and liquids, it is advantageous to cover not only the insertion section, but also the operation section of the endoscope. In European Patent Publication No. 0 349 479 A1, there is disclosed an endoscope system, in which not only the insertion section, but also the operation section of the endoscope are covered with a disposable protection cover. That is to say, the protection cover comprises a sheath-like portion for covering the insertion section of the endoscope and a bag-like portion for covering the operation section, said sheath-like portion and bag-like portion being integrally formed. It has been also proposed to form the sheath-like portion and bag-like portion as separate covers. For instance, in European Patent Publication No. 0 341 719 A1, there is proposed another known endoscope system, in which an insertion section of an endoscope is covered with a disposable protection sheath-like cover and an operation section of the endoscope is covered with a disposable protection bag-like cover which is mated or joined with the protection sheath-like cover is order to prevent the contamination through the junction of the sheath-like cover and the bag-like cover.
In order to treat a cavity of a patient body, there has been proposed to arrange a forceps channel within the sheath-like cover into which an endoscope is inserted.
As explained above, the disposable protection cover is inserted into a cavity of a patient, so that its lateral cross section should be circular. Further, in the protection cover, there are formed the forceps channel, air supply conduit channel and water supply conduit channel. These channels are extended within the protection cover. In a lateral cross section of the protection cover, these channels are arranged in a substantially semicircular space and the endoscope is inserted into the remaining substantially semicircular space, so that the insertion section of the endoscope should have a lateral cross section having a substantially semicircular shape. Moreover, in order to improve the examination, the distal end of the insertion section of the endoscope is bent in up and down directions as well as in right and left directions by operating angle knobs provided on the operation section of the endoscope. To this end a bending portion is provided near the distal end of the insertion section and a lateral cross section of this bending portion is also substantially semicircular. Then, a moment necessary for bending the distal end portion of the insertion section in some directions would be increased in relation to a width of the bending portion. That is to say, the bending portion could be easily bent in a direction which is substantially perpendicular to a diametric base side in the lateral cross section, but could not be easily bent in a direction which is substantially parallel with said diametric base side.
When the operation section of the endoscope is covered with the operation section cover, a shaft to which the angle knobs for bending the bending portion of the insertion section are secured has to be protruded from the operation section cover. Usually said shaft is provided on a side wall of the operation section, and thus the operation for covering the operation section of the endoscope with the operation section cover becomes cumbersome.
Further, in the known endoscope system comprising the endoscope and disposable protection cover, when the insertion section of the endoscope is inserted into and removed from the insertion section cover, the insertion section inserting channel is inflated. That is to say, the insertion section inserting channel is communicated with an inflator via an inflating tube which is detachably secured to a nipple portion of the insertion section cover. Therefore, in such an endoscope system, it is necessary to provide the inflator separately from the endoscope apparatus including a video processing device, light source device and fluid control device. Moreover, it is necessary to provide a hanger from which the protection cover is hung when the endoscope is covered with the protection cover. Therefore, an effective space of the examination room in reduced by the provision of the inflator.
In case of using the inflator, usually the inflator is driven after the inflating tube is coupled with the nipple portion of the insertion section cover by actuating a power switch provided on the inflator. This is cumbersome for the user. Further, if the power switch is contaminated, there is a possibility that the new protection cover might be contaminated by the user.
Moreover, in case of inserting the insertion section of the endoscope into the insertion section inserting channel formed within the insertion section cover, the insertion section inserting channel is inflated by connecting the inflating tube to the nipple portion. In this case, if the nipple portion is formed at a position which is close to the opening of said insertion section inserting channel, the outlet of the nipple portion is closed by the insertion section when the insertion section is inserted into the insertion channel only slightly. Then, the air could not be efficiently supplied to the insertion channel and the insertion channel is not inflated sufficiently. In this manner, the insertion section of the endoscope could not be inserted into the insertion section inserting channel easily.
As explained above, in the endoscope system the inflator has to be provided for inflating the insertion section inserting channel. This increases the cost of the whole endoscope system, so that it is preferable to dispense the inflator.